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“Oh, there’s no better training than jumping right in,” she said. “And you’re a quick study, I can tell. Just take a few seconds to go over your script, and dial the number.”
I stared at the script long enough to realize that the words weren’t making any sense in my head. No matter how long I sat there reading this thing, I would never be able to translate it into a tempting sales pitch. With Sandy sitting at my side listening to every word, I dialed the number and prayed that Susan Greer wasn’t home. No such luck.
“Hello!” I shouted into the receiver when a female voice answered. “Is Susan Greer available?”
“This is Susan Greer,” the woman said, a weary note of suspicion creeping into her voice.
“My name is Jane, and I’m calling this evening on behalf of Greenfield Studios. Our records show that you have indicated an interest in having your family portrait—”
“Not interested,” Susan grumbled, and hung up.
I shot a guilty look at Sandy. “It happens all the time,” she assured me. “Just try again.”
This time, I dialed Jamie Hurley of Portland, who was not much more receptive than Susan Greer. “Did you really interrupt my dinner to call me about this?” she demanded.
I closed my eyes and tried to pick back up on a spot in the script I remembered. “Our records show that you have indicated an interest in—”
“How did you even get my number, anyway? I’m supposed to be on a no-call list!”
When I stopped reading the script, I had time to process exactly how small and guilty I felt calling this poor woman. I scanned the excuses list for “How did you get my number?”
“Oh, um, well, you entered a contest to win a Caribbean crui—”
“I don’t have time for this,” she fumed. “I can’t believe you harass people at home like this. How do you live with yourself?
How do losers like you even get jobs? If you call me again, I’m going to file harassment charges!”
At the sound of the phone slamming in my ear, I turned to Sandy, my jaw slack. She patted my hand. “All right, honey, that wasn’t a great call, but you get those sometimes. And it takes everyone a few calls to develop a rhythm. When someone is rude, the best thing to do is to take a deep breath and make another call.”
So I made another call, and another. I was hung up on, had an air horn blown directly into my ear, and was called a bitch in three languages. Every time I dialed a number, I prayed the phone would ring unanswered. After four hours, when Chester Zimmerman of Piedmont, North Dakota, told me to commit unspeakable acts upon my own person with a cheese grater, I turned to Sandy, defeated.
“I don’t think I’m comfortable with this.”
“And they can tell, honey,” Sandy said, patting my hand again. “You just need to relax your voice and speak in a more natural, confident tone.”
I reached for my headset and realized I would rather attempt strangling myself with the phone cord than dial another number.
“I just don’t think this is going to work for me.”
Sandy smiled, despite the tension pulling at the corners of her mouth. “Well, we have other sales divisions you can try.”
“I don’t—”
“Oh, come on, Jane, nobody likes a quitter! I want to find a place for you here.” She pulled me out of my seat and motioned for me to follow her to another door, where we found another smoke-filled cubicle farm. “Greenfield Studios is just one sales arm of Greenfield Enterprises. Our sales force also sells Revita-Water, the new miracle cure that ‘they’ don’t want you know about.
Revita-Water’s scientifically calibrated balance of electrolytes and nutrients, plus a selection of health supplements and ephedra -
free diet aids, will prevent almost any illness, from cancer to fibromyalgia to Lyme disease. But the main benefit is this amazing product’s ability to reverse vampirism! Studies show that people who drink Revita-Water as part of their daily health regimen will not turn if they’re bitten. Just between you and me, police departments and emergency services are buying Revita-Water in huge batches for protection when the vampires finally launch their antihuman campaign. It practically sells itself.”
I stared at her. Apparently, Sandy had not yet noticed that I’d left the life-status box blank on my application. But now I knew where the company policy stood on vampires. “Beg pardon?”
“All right, so it doesn’t actually cure vampirism,” Sandy whispered. “But there’s nothing to prove that it won’t help people get healthy enough to outrun the filthy bastards. You know, I never thought, at my age, I’d have to worry about being attacked by vicious, bloodsucking monsters in my own home, but that ’s the state of the world today. People are looking for protection, for assurance. And Greenfield Enterprises is here to fill that need.”
Sandy wasn’t saying anything in the way of antivampire ranting that I hadn ’t heard before. Heck, my grandmother had said worse over Christmas dinner. But I’d never heard it as a vampire, and I found it hurt more than I thought it would. Being in such a small, crowded room, I’d been keeping my mind “clenched,” for lack of a better word, to keep the other women’s thoughts from bouncing around in my skull. But I imagined a little window in her head sliding open and was given a psychic slapping for my efforts. The fears and worries of every sad-eyed woman in the room came pouring into my head from all sides. Unpaid bills, cars with shoddy brakes, kids suspended from school, husbands who wouldn’t get off the couch and earn a paycheck, the soul-sucking drudgery of having to show up for this job every night and not having any other choice.
I shook the buzzing sensation out of my head and concentrated on Sandy. She may have hated vampires with a frantic and paranoid passion, but she sure liked me. She saw me doing well at Greenfield Enterprises. In fact, she saw me wearing the headset with pride, becoming a star employee, moving up in the ranks, and taking over the damned office so someone named Rico would finally let her retire. She had no idea I was a vampire; in fact, the thought never occurred to her.
I’d never been part of any minority before, unless you counted those who thought Timothy Dalton made a decent James Bond, and I didn’t particularly like people assuming that they could make rude comments about said minority because they thought I was “safe.” It was humiliating, and, worse, it really pissed me off.
